Welsh band Manic Street Preachers have staged a rock concert in Cuba for an audience of around 2,000 fans, including Cuban president Fidel Castro.

President Castro, 74, drew cheers from the crowd when he took a balcony seat just before Manic Street Preachers performed an hour-long set with songs denouncing US policy towards the island nation.

Castro stood and applauded after lead singer James Dean Bradfield performed an acoustic version of Baby Elian, a song about seven-year-old Elian Gonzales, who was returned to Cuba from the US last year after an international custody dispute.

Baby Elian refers to the United States as "the devil's playground" and says Elian had been "kidnapped to the promised land". Band members also dedicated a song to three-time Cuban Olympic boxing champion Felix Savon.

The punk-inspired band, whose albums include The Holy Bible and Everything Must Go, played tracks from their latest release, Know Your Enemy, whose cover sports a Cuban flag.

Their performance at Havana's Karl Marx theatre was billed as the biggest concert in Cuba by a Western rock band in 20 years.

"Cuba has shown its independence and is a good example that everything doesn't have to be 'Americanised' in this world," Bradfield told a pre-concert news conference.

In 1979, Billy Joel and Kris Kristofferson teamed up with Cuban musicians in an event called Havana Jams.